Our fun weekend!

Playing Ra

In summer we have been able to play more family games. I snapped a picture of us playing Ra. Sarah loves bidding on anything related to destruction. I'm not sure what that says about her!

Lately Matthew has been really interested in driveways and sidewalks that have cracks. He built this road with "cracks" in it all on our living room. He ripped up paper then taped it back together to simulate roads. 

Matthew and his roads

 Erik bought me a vegetarian cookbook for my birthday. I made peanut ginger noodles and stuffed tomatoes. Both recipes were amazing. I can't wait to make more recipes from the cookbook.

Stuffed tomatoes

 Last week Jenna went to a video game camp. She learned GameMaker and created several games. Her friend Alexis also went to the camp. They both really loved it. Now I just need to download GameMaker on one of our machines. We give the kids our old computers. I currently have 3 computers I'm using all the time (plus 3 raspberry pis - I guess that makes 6!) so I need to figure out when I can give them one of my old computers.

Jenna and Alexis

 Last weekend my parents took the kids and we had a weekend sans kids! On Saturday we went on a 13.2 mile (according to google fit!)  hike at Cesar Creek. Unfortunately we did not bring enough water. So for the last 1 1/2 miles we had no water and prior to that we were really conserving water. Once we got to our car we high tailed it to a gas station and bought a huge bottle of water and drank it within minutes! The hike was beautiful, however in one section there were so many trees covering the path we had to climb over them and it was pretty crazy!

On Sunday we rode bikes to church then went to J. Alexanders for dinner. Unfortunately Erik got pretty sick and dizzy on Sunday and couldn't eat much at dinner. I think the lack of water on Saturday was really bad for him.

Both nights we rented movies from the redbox and ate huge bowls of ice cream. Yay!                                                                                                                                                              

Erik picking berries on the hike

Where we had lunch

Us on the hike

In front of the lake

In front of the lake

part of the trail that was covered in logs

I took this picture standing on a log while Erik led the way in the trail

Kids love nature

Hocking Hills

For Fourth of July we went to Hocking Hills with the kids to do some fun hiking. They loved it! We walked all around Old Man's Cave. The kids love climbing.

They loved climbing!

More hocking hills fun

 Then after walking all around Old Man's Cave we went to our friend's Fourth of July party. They own 300 acres of beautiful wooded land near Hocking Hills. Erik rode an  ATV in the rain and got terrible poison ivy, but he had fun! They had a bouncy house there and even though it was rainy (and the bouncy house was soaked) the kids loved it. I think they loved it because it was wet and they slipped and slid all over it. The food was fantastic too - it was a potluck and I love potlucks!!

Erik on the ATV

 For Matthew's birthday he got to wear the black belt at tae kwon do. He was very happy - I'm not sure he behaved any better though!

Matthew as a black belt

 Last weekend we went on our annual camping trip with the Masts, Mabrys and Brubakers to Lazy River. It was a great trip as usual! The kids love the river and spent several hours playing with the rocks. Kids love nature and they had a fantastic time. The pool here is also nice and warm and we had fun swimming in it. I even did a somersault in the pool (my signature move). On Saturday Jen, Joy and I went to a discount store to buy books. Mostly for Jenna because she reads constantly. We cooked over a fire and played games in the evening. I love this annual camping trip!

All the kids

 Aunt Shelby is making a quilt for Matthew. He is super excited and checks the mail every day for the quilt. I have pictures of the girls quilts on their beds made by Shelby. I can't wait to see Matthew's quilt.

Sarah's room

Jenna's room

 I love zumba and my friend Tera (who is also one of my favorite zumba instructors) is moving to Tennessee. I'll miss her so much. My Mom and Jenna have been to her classes.

Me and Tera